I find where products lose customers and test what wins them back. At Intruder that lifted activation 37%, and for eight years I've built the design teams that keep doing it.

Keith Mason

Selected work

21 steps in nine sections

1 screen after sign-in

Most people who went on to buy did what they needed outside the old flow.

Share of trials completing each point

Step 1: welcome
56.1%
Step 2: add targets
32.8%
All 21 steps
1.1%
Intruder's redesigned onboarding: one screen, Add and scan targets, with four ways to start and cloud assets recommended

2025–26 · Intruder

Improving activation by cutting onboarding from 21 steps to one

Lead designer and project lead, owning product direction

  • +37% customer activation after the full release, following +30% in the initial test
  • +53% median licences bought per customer at activation
Assets found in a Google Cloud subscription, unresolved: each with its type, exposure, region and a recommendation to review, exclude or add as a target

2025 · Intruder

Repositioning asset discovery as a core product experience

Lead designer and project lead, co-owning scope with engineering

  • Revenue from targets added through cloud integrations grew 10× in the six months after release
  • 11× higher activation for ICP customers who connected their cloud accounts, compared with those who didn't

Keith consistently gave me feedback in a timely manner and in a way that left no ambiguity about where I stood. I never had to guess. When I needed to improve, he gave me grace, time, and tangible support to get there. Even when I failed, he helped me see the growth in it. Not many people understand this nuance of motivating the people who report to them, but Keith absolutely does.

He was also always the first to jump in when I needed support, and he brought genuine empathy to every situation. Yet he never let that compromise the standard my role required. That balance is rare.

Nika Vižintin Prinz
Nika Vižintin Prinz Lead Product Designer, Intruder

More work

Intruder brand before and after evolution
2024
  • +33% product team capacity, from lower build and handover overheads once the revised design system was in place
  • The first major conference stand after the rebrand drew bigger crowds than competitors with far larger budgets
  • +52% year-on-year enterprise growth, which the brand contributed to alongside earlier pricing work

Evolving a cybersecurity brand for enterprise growth

Lead designer and project lead, owning creative direction

To win enterprise trust without losing the personality customers loved, we kept the logo, the signature yellow and the typography, and rolled out marketing first, so the direction was tested in market before it touched the product.

Brand Leadership Design systems
The metrics framework in use: the North Star, threats resolved, above its three drivers and their levers, each a live chart in Count
2024
  • Adopted company-wide as every product team’s measure of success, and featured by Count, the BI tool it was built in, as a customer case study
  • +140% vulnerabilities detected and +94% targets monitored
  • 10× faster median time to fix for enterprise customers

Crafting a metrics framework to guide product success

Initiator, framework designer and project lead

Replacing ad hoc revenue tracking with one behaviour-based measure, I redefined activation from “ran a first scan” to “Intruder found something real”: trials that found an issue converted at 10.27%, against 2.88% for those that found none.

Strategy Product operations
Two screens from Newsflare's mobile upload: the entry point, which leads with the reach a video gets, and the confirmation once a video has uploaded
2022
  • Twice the uploads from Content Partners, from a one-time setup
  • +50% uploads from Chasers, the segment producing around 65–70% of saleable video
  • Five upload journeys consolidated into one

How research-led design doubled supply from key customer segments

Product and design lead

Rather than one better upload flow, we built separate solutions for different contributor segments, including an automated feed import that meant the highest-volume partners never had to upload at all.

Research Segmentation B2B2C
Process documents Keith wrote for Intruder's design team, including a design governance framework and design review working principles
2017–26
  • One designer promoted to lead and pay rises secured across the Intruder team
  • A brand and campaigns role argued for and hired, so product designers stopped doubling as graphic designers
  • Quarterly design metrics presented to the executive team, shaping roadmap priorities and resourcing

Building the processes and people that make good design decisions repeatable

Product Design Manager, Intruder; Head of User Experience and Design, Newsflare

Most of this work never shows up in a case study: the governance that settles who owns a decision, the review principles and team rituals, and the coaching that took designers from executing briefs to leading cross-functional work. At Newsflare it began with building the product team from the ground up.

Leadership Coaching Design operations

Earlier roles

  • Senior UX Architect, apps and in-storeArgos and Sainsbury’s · 2014–17
  • UI and UX DesignerHouseTrip · 2013–14
  • Digital DesignerLush · 2011–13

Now

Updated

Looking
Open to design leadership and principal designer roles, permanent or fractional (two to three days a week), UK remote.
Consulting
Working independently since October, starting with product strategy for a growing retailer as it moves into a store four to five times its size.
Building
Paideia, an AI coaching tool for home educators that I research, design and build on my own, now in interviews with more households ahead of a wider trial.
Running
The Stromata, a public-domain reading library I designed and built through to production code.

What people say

Keith has a great ability to understand both the technical side and the commercial side of things, which is not that common. He was very good at framing problems clearly and bringing the right level of evidence to support decisions, without overcomplicating things.

Working with him didn't just improve the design, it genuinely made the product better for every user type. He had a strong influence on decisions, even when he wasn't directly responsible for them, and always in a very collaborative and respectful way.

Andrea Cavalieri
Andrea Cavalieri CTO, Newsflare

Keith and Naomi came to the senior leadership team and said this isn't working, and because of them we had that discussion. I sat down with Keith and we tried to work out the key drivers. This really for me is about understanding at a top level whether all of the levers and components are moving in the right direction.

Andy Hornegold
Andy Hornegold VP Product, Intruder

Keith is an excellent people manager. He is a thoughtful, caring, inspirational, and conscientious leader. Who is not afraid to speak up for his and his team's beliefs. Keith's input into People/HR projects I was working on led to adjustments that ultimately improved our working culture.

Max Encke
Max Encke Head of People, Intruder

The projects I worked on with Keith had a material impact on the performance of the business. As a designer and product manager, Keith always approached problems collaboratively and with an eagerness to find creative solutions. Importantly, Keith also helped grow the culture of data-driven decision-making.

David Hickey
David Hickey Editor-in-Chief, Newsflare

Keith is a highly skilled and focused product manager. He approaches every challenge with patience and understanding. He has been invaluable when it comes to learning, understanding and improving our user experience. He is great at working with the wider business to bridge the gap between the tech and product teams and the commercial teams.

Sophie Shuttleworth
Sophie Shuttleworth Customer Success Manager, Newsflare

What I'm looking for

The right conversation,
not just the next role.

I work best in remote, async-leaning product organisations where design already has a seat but hasn't yet realised its full influence, whether that's a scaling company from Series A to C or a smaller team where I can wear both product and design hats in a 0-to-1 context.

The roles I find most rewarding involve building research practice, coaching designers into broader strategic contributors, and doing the connective work between what users need and what the business is trying to achieve.

I'm open to the right conversation.

If any of that sounds like the problem you have,

hello@iamkeithmason.com

UK remote, permanent or fractional. How working with me starts